Archive for the ‘Drunk Driving’ Category

Curry Todd's mug shot, which will be used by gun control advocates from now on as a poster for their cause. Thanks, Curry. Oh, and thanks for driving drunk, too.

Sometimes you just want to slap yourself on the forehead and ask, “WHAT WAS I THINKING?”

Tennessee state representative Curry Todd should have a real sore forehead by now, having embarrassed Tennessee gun rights advocates by being arrested for driving drunk. But wait! There’s more! He had a holstered .38 Special in the car with him. But, wait! There’s even more!

Curry Todd was the “driving” force behind the new state law that removed the prohibition against carrying a concealed weapon WITH A CONCEALED CARRY PERMIT into a bar or restaurant where alcohol is served. And yes, Todd was also charged with the possession of a firearm while intoxicated.

You can be sure the irony of a gun-rights advocate being arrested for a gun law violation has not escaped notice among the foaming-at-the-mouth gun-haters. Take some anti-nausea medicine and read The Tennessean online, and the comments about the related stories, if you want to see anti-gun Schadenfreude on full display.

But, something is missing in all this coverage. Where is the outrage against a drunk driver?

While having a gun in the car when he was driving drunk was illegal and utterly stupid, there is nothing to indicate the firearm ever left the car, that it ever left the holster, that it was ever pointed at anyone or anything — and certainly — no evidence that it was ever used to harm anyone.

What could much more easily have resulted in tragedy that night was not the gun.

Forgive me if I sound a little strident about this, but the deadliest weapon in this story wasn’t IN the car; it WAS the car. Thousands of pounds of steel that could have easily killed a whole crowd was being operated by a guy who was drunk, according to the police report. And, if you doubt the police report, check the mug shot, above. What is it about driving drunk that is not at least as repugnant to people on either side of the Second Amendment issue as the fact that a firearm was present?

Why do I seem strident about anybody driving drunk? It’s personal. Somebody very close to me was killed by a drunk driver, and it’s not something one forgets.

On June 6, 1994 (yes, the 50th anniversary of D-Day), I got a hysterical call from my mother-in-law, telling me between sobs that my 19-year-old nephew — her oldest grandson, and my wife’s oldest nephew — James Robert Anemone, had been killed, along with his 17-year-old serious girlfriend, by a drunk driver. It’s another story entirely, but James was as close as I have ever come to having a son, and I was as close as he would ever come to having a father.

James and his girl were both sober. The drunk was a minor with a history of driving drunk and public intoxication charges, and he was drunk enough that evening that his blood alcohol level would have put a non-drinker into a coma. But this guy was used to being drunk, and he was used to driving drunk and getting away with it — until he crossed the center line and hit two innocent people head-on, and killed them. With his car.

Curry Todd’s gun was never a danger to anyone, but his car and his drunken state were a danger to everyone unfortunate enough to share the road with him. Guns are used hundreds of thousands or millions of times a year to prevent crimes, but I know of no reports of drunks using their cars to prevent a crime; and tens of thousands of deaths each year result from drunk driving.

Which will get more attention from the “mainstream” press in the Curry Todd incident — the gun, or the car piloted by the guy in the mug shot, above?

Now, what do gun rights advocates do about this ugly situation?

Do we all crawl into a cave and abandon the cause of gun rights? Not just NO, but, HELL NO. We can do what I am doing , here — we can offer Curry Todd the opportunity to redeem himself somewhat in our eyes by offering his resignation from the legislature. At the very, very least, he should humble himself before the public with a sincere, deeply-felt apology, and a hard commitment to dealing with his alcoholism.

And, he needs to promise his constituents, his colleagues, his family, and me — that he will never get behind the wheel drunk again.